3 Creating new documents

When you create a new document, you need to configure various options so that your document will work with your computer and printer.

You may also want to define several text and paragraph styles, which can be used to improve the look of your document and make it easier to read.

This chapter explains:

Creating a new document

All new documents are based on existing templates. All templates contain at least one style, which is a base style, and some may contain details of the page size and printable area as well as text, pictures, headers or footers.

To create a new document:

  1. RISC OS: Click Select on the Fireworkz icon on the icon bar.
  2. New tool button Windows: Click the New tool button on the toolbar (or choose New from the File menu).
  3. If you have more than one template file available, a list of available templates will appear for you to choose from. If there is only one template available, a new document based on it will be opened automatically.
  4. Select the template you want from the list and click Create, or simply double-click on the desired template in the list. A new document based on the chosen template will be opened. It will contain all the styles and any text and pictures included in that template.

Alternatively, you can create a new document by double-clicking on a template's file icon in the Filer (RISC OS) or File Explorer (Windows). Note that this is only valid for templates that have been saved with the All option selected.

Yet another way of creating a new document on Windows is to right-click in File Explorer, and choose Colton Software Fireworkz document from the New menu. Windows creates an empty Fireworkz document file and prompts you for a name for that file. This document can then be opened as with any other.

Opening existing documents

Much of the time you will want to re-open existing documents for further editing.

The file will be opened in Fireworkz.

Templates

You can save yourself a lot of time and effort by saving your page designs as templates. If you do this, you will be able to create new documents based on them without having to go through all the procedures listed in the sections above. Instead, the page details will be predefined and styles will already be set up. Template documents may also include text, such as letterheads or fax headers, and this is another way to save time.

For examples of stationery and template files, look at the directory Templates in the Examples directory. This includes several useful templates, for documents such as memos, faxes and letters.

A small number of templates are included in the Fireworkz application, in the directory
RISC OS: !Fireworkz.Resources.UK.Templates
Windows: %APPDATA%\Colton Software\Fireworkz\Templates .
These are the templates that are presented for selection in the Create Document dialogue box.

Setting up a template file

Setting up a template file is no different from creating an ordinary document. Any document can be saved as a template.

  1. Define all the styles you want in the document.
  2. Enter the text you want, e.g. your name and address for a letterhead, in the style you want it.
  3. Add any pictures that you want to include, such as a logo to appear on a letterhead, or a backdrop.

Saving a template

To save a file as a template, first set it up as described in the previous section then do the following:

  1. Choose Save template from the File menu.
  2. The Save template dialogue box will appear.
  3. Type in the name of the new template (ending in the extension .fwt if on Windows).
  4. Choose one of the options for what to include in the template by selecting the appropriate radio button. You can save the entire document (styles, other definitions, pictures and text), just the styles defined in the document, or a single style. If you choose to save a single style you should select one from the list by clicking on it. If you want to create documents based on the template, you must choose the All option.
  5. Click Save.
  6. The template will be saved in the directory
    RISC OS: <Choices$Write>.Fireworkz.Template
    Windows: %APPDATA%\Colton Software\Fireworkz\Templates .
    This means that the template will then appear on the template selector list when you create a new document.
  7. If you do not want to save the template in the standard location, you should type in the full pathname. On RISC OS, you can drag the file icon to the directory where you want it to be saved.

Removing templates from the template selector

Using templates to reformat existing documents

Once you have created a document its formatting is not fixed. You can add a template file to the document to change its formatting.

You can add a template to a document to reformat it, or drop a document file icon on to a new document based on a template to format it.

Reformatting documents in RISC OS

Either:

  1. Load the document that you want to format.
  2. Open the directory window containing the template you want to use, either a directory containing your own templates, or the standard templates which will be in
    Choices:Fireworkz.Template .
  3. Drag the template file icon into the open document window.
  4. When you release the mouse button the document will be reformatted using the rules outlined below.

or:

  1. Double-click the template icon to create a new document based on it.
  2. Drag the file icon of the document you want to reformat into the new document window.
  3. The document will be reformatted using the rules outlined below.

Reformatting documents in Windows

  1. Open the document you want to reformat.
  2. Open tool button Choose Insert file from the File menu (or Ctrl-click the Open tool button on the toolbar).
  3. Navigate to the directory containing the template file that you want to use: either a directory containing your own templates, or the standard templates which will be in
    %APPDATA%\Colton Software\Fireworkz\Templates
    and select that template file.
  4. Click Open.
  5. The template will be added to the document, which will be reformatted using the rules outlined below.

Rules for merging templates into documents

The following rules are applied when a new template is dragged into a document: